The top Republican tax legislator is accusing the Obama administration of keeping a plan for comprehensive tax reform secret.
“I believe the Treasury Department has completed – or is very close to completing – such a plan, but refuses to make it public,” House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp said Wednesday.
Camp, who earlier this year introduced his own plan for overhauling the entire U.S. tax code, noted that the Obama administration has acknowledged that only broad-based tax reform can solve the tax problems facing the country — including those behind the recent increase of corporate inversions, in which businesses merge with foreign companies in low-tax countries to move their headquarters to the country and save taxes.
“Until we address the root of the problem, we will continue to read regular reports of companies leaving the U.S. Now is the time to act, and I call on the administration to send me an actual, workable tax plan,” Camp said in a press release.
Camp made similar remarks Wednesday morning at an event on tax reform at the Business Roundtable in Washington that included Obama economic adviser Jason Furman.
Furman said the White House wanted to be careful about how it rolled out any tax-reform plan, to avoid having specific details raise criticism ahead of time.
Nevertheless, he added, Obama would “love to sign a business tax reform bill.”
But Camp said the lack of specific legislation made it harder to begin a negotiation process over tax reform.
Earlier in the week, Treasury Secretary Jack Lew reiterated his call for comprehensive tax reform and short-term legislation to tighten the rules restricting tax inversions. Lew said the Treasury was also close to making a decision on using executive action to change tax rules to undercut the benefits of inversions if Congress doesn’t act quickly.
